


Mission's end, mission's beginning

by praeteritio



Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: The Original Series
Genre: Horta, M/M, Mpreg, Pon Farr
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-22
Updated: 2017-12-03
Packaged: 2018-10-22 12:21:32
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 14,671
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10696920
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/praeteritio/pseuds/praeteritio
Summary: Facing the end of the five-year mission, Kirk discovers a new adventure is about to begin, courtesy of Spock'spon farr, and a few extra organs.





	1. A structural difference

Spock’s mouth was hot as it plundered his, skin so hot where it pressed against him, and Jim melted under it. He let his legs fall apart and Spock sank between them. Jim’s slit, already wet and throbbing, quivered as he felt the head of Spock’s penis brush against it. Jim writhed on the bed, desperate to feel Spock inside him. But Spock was lifting him by the hips and probing his anus, preparing to take him that way. Jim groaned in frustration and pushed his hand between their bellies, not too proud now to give himself what he wanted. But he couldn’t reach. Instead he grabbed his own swollen cock and pumped it, hard, as Spock thrust inside him.

The next morning Jim woke at 05:17 and staggered to the bathroom just in time to empty his stomach into the toilet. God, what was happening to him?

 

Since the age of four Jim had known that he was not quite like his big brother, or the cousins who sometimes joined him for bath time after playing in the mud. As he grew older, he came to understand that he possessed female sexual organs as well as male, that it was something to do with the terrible wars that had plagued Earth nearly two hundred years earlier, and that he was a perfectly healthy male nonetheless. When he was older, the doctors told him, he could choose to have the extra organs removed. But Jim never menstruated, as did some other boys with the same condition; he never experienced any noticeable sensation from his female parts; and soon all but forgot the extra orifice nestled behind his testicles.

If asked, Jim would have said he scarcely thought about his difference. If he was honest with himself, he might have said that it made him even more determined in his male sexual dominance. None of his female lovers had ever discovered his secret, or at least none had ever mentioned it. And, before Spock, he’d never been with a male.

Spock, of course, had noticed almost right away.

‘You are Rutgers XY,’ he remarked, matter-of-factly, as he prepared to penetrate Jim for just the second time.

‘Yup,’ said Jim, just as pragmatically, though his breathing was labored. He was on all fours, and his cock was knocking impatiently against his belly. He wanted Spock inside him _now_. ‘Me and one in a thousand other Human males.’

‘One in 1028.6.’

‘Close enough.’

Spock was probing Jim’s back entrance with one finger, then two. ‘Do you possess the full Rutgers phenotype?’

‘What?’ Jim spluttered.

‘Only 72.51% of Rutgers individuals develop a complete set of female reproductive organs.’

‘I wouldn’t know,’ said Jim. He wasn’t sure he liked where this was going. ‘I’m a _guy_ , Spock.’

‘I never doubted that.’

‘Good.’ Jim grunted as Spock added a third finger. ‘Now, if you don’t mind, I’d rather not talk about that, and get on with this’—he clenched hard around Spock’s fingers—‘instead.’

‘As you wish.’

 

Spock, good as his word, had never mentioned the matter again. For a while it was in the back of Jim’s mind. Especially after the encounter with Khan, he hated to think that he was in any way a product of the Eugenics Wars. But, by the time he’d saved the galaxy a few more times, he had forgotten once again about his biological quirk—that was, until Spock’s _pon farr_.

Jim had always wondered when Spock’s aborted mating would come back to bite him, and bite it did, nearly two years after the first time. Fortunately Jim had been able to schedule leave for them both. They’d taken a chalet at an exclusive resort on Alpha and locked themselves away to see out the fever. Jim had packed a full arsenal of things they might need—lubricant, medikit, electrolyte tablets, more lubricant. He’d anticipated everything, he thought. What he hadn’t expected was that Spock would take him in his virgin slit, very first go.

Jim had buried his face in the pillow as Spock fucked him in this whole new way. He wanted to hate it—yet, after the initial pain and shock, he found himself wanting more, and more. He thrust back upon Spock, clenching hard around him, while the pistoning of Spock’s hips drove Jim’s own swollen cock into the mattress.

In retrospect he should have seen it coming. As Spock’s fever approached, Jim had been aware, for the first time, of a moist discharge from his extra entrance. By the time he sat next to Spock on the shuttle to Alpha, he’d found himself literally wet between the legs. Spock had warned him that, as the mate of one entering _pon farr_ , he might begin to experience symptoms of the fever himself. Jim had expected the hard-on, but not this other, unaccustomed form of arousal. Jim’s face flushed hot when he saw the damp patch he had left on the shuttle upholstery. Still, Jim had not exactly complained when Spock had fucked him like a girl for nearly three days straight.

 

Since then Jim had found himself wanting it that way, though he never confessed his desire. And he’d found something else, as well, a few weeks after they returned from leave.

The first sign of anything amiss was that he needed to pee more often. Then it was his morning coffee making him want to retch. When he started actually retching—early morning and mid-afternoon seemed to be his stomach’s favorite times—Jim began to suspect what the problem was and took himself off to see Bones.

McCoy was in his office, apparently not working terribly hard, when Jim presented himself.

‘Drink?’ The doctor offered, removing his feet from the second chair.

‘I’d… better not.’

McCoy shrugged. ‘Then what can I do for you?’

Jim sat and deliberately folded his hands on the table. No sense beating about the bush. ‘I think I’m pregnant.’

McCoy nearly snorted his brandy. ‘What?’

Jim could see Bones was about to dismiss his statement as a joke, and he wasn’t in the mood for jokes. ‘You know I’m Rutgers.’

That got the doctor’s attention. ‘You telling me you decided to open for business down there?’

Jim’s look announced that he _really_ wasn’t in the mood.

‘Sorry, Jim.’ McCoy set his glass down. ‘Spock’s _pon farr_ ,’ he surmised.

‘Uh-huh.’

‘But—Jim, are you sure? I mean, I’ve never had any reason to think you’re, well, fertile that way. You told me yourself it was a bit of a “dead zone” down there.’

‘That’s what I thought.’ Jim shifted in his seat. ‘But when Spock’s fever came on I started getting… wet. And, since we’ve been back… the last few days I’ve been chucking my guts up, and I need to pee all the time.’

‘Hmm. That could be any number of things. But stand up and I’ll check you out.’

Jim stood awkwardly, heart pounding, while the scanner whirred over him. Bones’ face was frustratingly inscrutable. ‘Well?’

‘Just a moment, Jim.’ McCoy swapped the small scanner for his tricorder. ‘Well, I’ll be… I guess the word is “congratulations”, Jim. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but you’re pregnant, all right. About eight weeks.’

‘You’re sure?’ Jim’s voice was toneless.

‘I’ll run some more tests, but yes, I’m sure.’ McCoy set the tricorder aside. ‘Your uterus is enlarged and I’m reading a fetal heartbeat.’

‘A heartbeat.’ Jim’s own heart skipped.

‘That’s right. My guess is Spock’s fever prompted you to ovulate, just like in a Vulcan female. I have to say I’m a little surprised the two of you managed to conceive naturally, but I suppose Spock is half-human—you are _sure_ it’s Spock’s?’

‘Positive.’ If Jim had been less shocked he would have been angry.

McCoy perched on the edge of the desk. ‘So, what are you going to do?’

For a moment Jim stared at a spot on the deck. When he looked up, his eyes were bright. ‘I’m going to have a baby.’

McCoy broke into a grin. It was all mad, completely mad—but he’d always been a sucker for babies. ‘Those are words I never thought I’d hear! Have you told Spock?’

Jim shook his head. ‘I wanted to be sure.’

‘What do you think he’ll say?’

Jim looked at the floor again. ‘I don’t know.’

Bones clasped his shoulder. ‘I think he’ll be thrilled.’

 

For almost the first time in his life, Jim struggled to focus on the activity of the bridge. He was pregnant. He was going to have a baby. He and Spock were going to have a family. It felt like a miracle, a second chance—the chance he had passed up with Carol, never had with Edith, lost with Miramanee—and it could hardly have come at a better time. For a year now, Jim had dreaded the mission’s end and the emptiness he would feel while his ship was refitted, if they even let him keep her. But now he had been handed a new adventure, not for five years but for eighteen, twenty, for life—and the ultimate bond between himself and Spock.

Jim looked at Spock, bent over his scanners. More than once Jim considered calling him off the bridge to tell him the news. They were going to have a _baby_ —that was a discovery more momentous than anything they might find in this ancient dust cloud. He watched Spock’s elegant hands dance expertly over his panel. Jim yearned to feel those hands on his skin, on the place Bones had showed him, low on his pelvis, where their child’s heart was beating. But Jim resisted, waited.

‘Captain?’

Jim had not even noticed the yeoman’s approach. ‘Hmm?’

‘Fuel consumption report, sir.’

‘Of course.’ Jim skimmed the report and initialed it.

At the science station, Spock glanced once at his captain and lover before turning back to his scanners. Jim seemed distracted, and that was unusual. Spock would ask the reason, later.

 

When his shift ended, Jim did not linger. His growing uterus was playing havoc with his bladder—that was perfectly normal, Bones had assured him—and his mind was anywhere but the dust cloud.

Spock joined him in the turbolift. Jim knew they had fifty-eight seconds alone until the lift reached Deck 5. He said nothing, but something must have shown in his eyes.

‘Jim?’

Jim smiled. ‘My cabin?’

Spock nodded and followed him to his quarters.

When Jim finished in the bathroom he found Spock standing in the sleeping alcove looking at the painting they’d bought on their first leave together. It was a landscape with moonrise—nothing special, really, except that it was the same landscape they’d looked out at as they made love on their private terrace. It always gave Jim a little thrill to look at it—and to see visitors admire it, without realizing what it signified. Spock, of course, knew perfectly well. Jim approached behind him and wrapped his arms around Spock’s narrow waist. ‘I thought we might eat in tonight.’

‘That would be agreeable.’ Spock turned in Jim’s arms, his own hands going to Jim’s flanks.

Jim leaned forward and kissed him on the lips, chastely at first, then more ardently, pressing forward as Spock’s lips parted beneath his. Already he felt his cock getting interested—god, Spock smelled so good, felt so good, it would be so easy to fall to his bunk right now—but that was not what Jim intended for the evening. Jim pulled back, and smiled at Spock’s soft sound of disappointment.

‘I’m going to hit the gym, first.’

Spock’s eyes crinkled in one of his secret smiles. ‘A commendable plan. You do seem… restless.’

Jim traced the line of Spock’s jaw, which was shadowed with stubble. He could tell Spock now—but he wasn’t ready, not quite yet. ‘And whose fault would that be?’ he said, lightly. ‘You know, I never thought I could be jealous of the _Enterprise_ , but those scanners of yours—that’s a different matter.’

Spock captured Jim’s hand, though he would not give Jim the advantage of knowing that it tickled. ‘In that case,’ he said, ‘it is only fair that I join you in your workout.’

 

Jim went through his usual routine—Bones had said there was no danger, and he supposed he had better stay in shape as much as possible, while he still could. Jim felt a twinge of regret at the thought of losing his hard-won abs—but then, he was trading them for something much better.

He set down the barbell and wiped his face with the back of his arm. ‘Well, that’s worked up an appetite,’ he told Spock. ‘I’ll be in the showers.’

Jim opted for a water shower, as usual. He threw his head back, and let the almost-too-hot spray wash the sweat from his hair and face. Then he squirted a handful of soap and lathered himself all over. He let his hand linger over his stomach. It was hard to believe there was really a baby growing inside him, that in just a few months his belly would be big and round. Jim shivered even as the hot water streamed over his skin. Then he shut the shower off and quickly scrubbed himself with his towel before knotting it around his waist and joining Spock in the change room.

‘Dinner?’ There was no-one else present and Jim allowed himself to brush Spock’s hand, just once.

‘Indeed.’

They ate largely in silence, but companionable silence. Jim’s appetite had returned, thanks to Bones’ anti-nausea shot, and he was hungry. He ate his dinner, two bread rolls, and was contemplating desert when the comm whistled.

‘Kirk here.’

‘Lieutenant Rinaldi, sir. Sensors have detected a hyper-dense zone bearing 2818 mark 8 from our position, impenetrable on our current scan pattern. Requesting instructions, sir.’

Jim glanced at Spock. ‘Alter course to scanning range, Lieutenant. Mr Spock is with me, and will give further instructions.’

Jim listened while Spock ordered a full set of scans of the dense zone and asked to be notified of any unusual findings. To Jim’s relief, he did not offer to attend himself. After all, Jim thought, hyper-dense dust was still just dust. He was anxious to report the results of his own scans—at the appropriate juncture.

Spock closed the channel. ‘The diversion should add less than ten hours to our schedule, and might prove interesting.’

‘But not “fascinating”.’

‘I have no reason to expect so.’

Jim smiled. God he loved his Vulcan. ‘Dessert, Mr Spock?’

‘I see your appetite has returned.’

Jim made a noncommittal gesture. He’d managed to keep the vomiting to himself, but of course Spock had noticed him picking at meals. ‘Apple pie or ice cream?’

‘Which are you having?’

‘Both.’

When they had eaten, Spock left the dishes by the door for Jim’s yeoman to collect and stood with his hands clasped loosely behind his back.

‘Do you have plans for the rest of the evening, Jim?’

Did he ever. It had been a few days since they’d slept together—Jim hadn’t felt up to it—but it was not just his appetite for food that had returned. ‘Do you, Mr Spock?’

‘I had intended to review the data from today’s scans in order to refine our focus; however—’

‘However, that can wait till morning.’

‘If you would rather I directed my attentions elsewhere, yes.’

Jim got to his feet and laid his hands on Spock’s arms. ‘I’m sure I can think of something.’

 

‘Spock, oh god yes, yes—’

Jim mouthed the words against Spock’s chest and neck as he writhed under the Vulcan’s weight. Their cocks were hard together and he knew that if they kept this up he was going to explode, but he wanted— _needed_ —to feel Spock inside him. He spread his thighs a little wider, welcoming Spock between them. ‘Please.’ He sucked hard on Spock’s lip this time, drawing it into his mouth as he wished to take all of Spock’s length inside him.

Spock made a low guttural noise and slid his hands under Jim’s buttocks, coaxing his hips off the mattress, but Jim halted him and guided his cock instead to his other entrance, already slick and swollen with desire. Jim shuddered as he felt the hot tip of Spock’s penis thrum against him at nearly three hundred beats per minute. He was not ashamed anymore. This was part of him; this was how they had conceived the baby that now grew inside him. ‘Please, Spock. Like this.’

‘Are you sure?’ It took all Spock’s strength of will to resist, but resist he would, for life, if need be. Jim was male, and he wished to have sex as a male—he had made that clear early in their relationship, and if that was what Jim wanted, that was what Spock wanted, too. What had happened in the fever had been an aberration.

‘Do it.’ Jim was panting. He bit down on Spock’s lip and bucked up against him.

Evidently Jim had changed his mind. Spock hesitated no longer. He slid into Jim and soon set up a rhythm, slamming his hips into Jim’s thighs. Jim brought his knees up a little to welcome Spock deeper within him. Jim’s own cock throbbed between their bellies, but it didn’t matter. He clenched hard around Spock, moaning aloud as the hot iron of Spock’s penis pounded into his prostate and some other place he hadn’t even known existed until two months before. He clutched at Spock’s back, at his ass, urging him deeper still, if that were possible. And then Jim came, warm and wet between their bodies. Spock followed soon afterwards with the improbable high pitched yowl that signaled the very peak of Vulcan ecstasy.

Spock collapsed onto Jim. He did not withdraw, and Jim did not want him to, not ever. He caressed Spock’s slackening penis with his body, experimenting with a whole new set of muscles, of sensations.

‘Jim,’ Spock groaned, and Jim could almost have laughed for joy—he loved Spock like this, in extremis, all Vulcan control stripped away. Instead he sought Spock’s mouth and returned the sentiment with a long, bone-melting kiss that left them both gasping for air. Then he pushed a hand back through Spock’s disarrayed hair. ‘All right. I’ll release my prisoner. For now.’ Jim delivered one final squeeze to underscore his meaning before letting Spock roll free. Jim followed, fitting their bodies together like two pieces of a jigsaw, and Spock raised a hand to caress Jim’s cheek.

The ship had never seemed quieter than it did while Jim prepared to speak his next words. The thumping of his heart sounded in his head as clear as a drum. Jim drew an unsteady breath. ‘I have a surprise for you,’ he whispered, and felt Spock shiver as the words ghosted over his sensitive ear.

Spock almost smiled. ‘Jim, I fear another of your surprises may precipitate a situation inimical to sleep.’

‘I’d say that’s a certainty.’

Spock turned slightly. ‘Is something the matter?’

‘That depends on you.’ Jim swallowed. Now or never. He took Spock’s hand and guided it to his pelvis. ‘We’re going to have a baby.’

Jim felt Spock stiffen. ‘Baby?’ He was sitting up now, staring at Jim. ‘You are going to have a baby. You are… pregnant.’

‘Uh-huh.’ Jim held fiercely to Spock’s hand.

‘How?’

‘How do you think, Mr Science Officer?’ Jim circled his thumb over Spock’s. ‘Seems I’ve got a full working set after all.’

Jim’s words were light but his heart was racing. He was so sure Spock would welcome the news. He didn’t know what he would do if he was wrong.

For the time being, Spock seemed hardly capable of thought, let alone speech. Jim felt a tremor run through him. He sat up as well and put his arms around Spock’s neck, kissed him on the cheek. ‘So,’ he said, biting down the quaver in his own voice, ‘how do you feel about starting a family?’

The next few seconds felt almost like time warp, stretched out into eons. Only Jim’s pounding heart kept pace with the universe as he waited for Spock’s response. When it came, it floored him. Spock was _beaming_.

‘Jim!’ Recovered from his shock, Spock seized Jim almost bruisingly. ‘Beloved… I never thought it possible.’

‘It’s possible,’ Jim said breathlessly. ‘It’s happened.’

‘I never thought to hope—’ Spock broke off.

‘I never thought at all,’ said Jim. ‘But now—I’m so happy, Spock. I’m so happy you’re happy.’

‘I am delighted, beloved.’ In such circumstances, Spock was sure, happiness was logical. He kissed Jim’s hair. ‘When I learned you were Rutgers, I did wonder, but I never—’

‘You never said anything.’

‘I did not think you wanted children, Jim.’

‘I… I don’t think I knew. But Spock—we’re going to have a  _baby_.’ Jim tugged Spock’s hand back to his belly, and this time Spock’s touch was a caress, smoothing warmly over Jim’s skin. ‘I’m afraid there’s not much to feel yet. But it—he or she—is in there, growing—and making me need to pee all the time.’ Jim laughed and squeezed Spock’s hand. ‘Our baby, Spock.’

‘H-how long?’

‘You must be in shock if you haven’t figured that by now! Just over eight weeks.’ Jim didn’t need to remind Spock what they’d been doing eight weeks earlier.

Spock’s hand was still resting almost reverently on Jim’s belly.

‘So that’s about seven months till the baby’s due,’ Jim went on. ‘We’ll be back on Earth before then—I guess I’ll be getting pretty big, but I’ll just let everyone think I’m fat. Wouldn’t be the first time.’ Jim kissed Spock again, on the tip of his ear. ‘Then we’ll put the _Enterprise_ in dock, get a house somewhere, and try our hands at being parents.’

‘You plan to continue.’

‘Sorry?’

‘You plan to complete this mission in command of the _Enterprise_.’

‘Well—yes. There’s less than five months to go—we’ll be home in time for the baby, and I’d like to see it out.’

‘Jim, that is hardly safe—’

‘No, it isn’t, but we’ve survived this far, and Bones told me the child is tucked up nice and snug in here. Otherwise I wouldn’t have been throwing myself around in the gym.’

‘And what about when the child grows? What about Klingon disruptors? Tholians? Romulans? Is your body proof against those?’

‘Spock—’ Jim started speaking before he knew what he was trying to say. He had simply assumed he would continue in command of the _Enterprise_ until mission’s end. Now Spock was making him realize that might not be safe, if Starfleet—if _Spock_ —even let him. But that wasn’t an argument he wanted to have now. Strategic retreat was in order. ‘OK, Spock, we’ll talk about it.’ Jim couldn’t help but feel a little deflated. ‘But I’m glad you’re happy, because I am utterly delighted to be starting a family with you. Now…’ he pressed his mouth against Spock’s and flicked his tongue out to caress Spock’s upper lip. ‘How about a little celebration?’

They made love again, gently this time. Jim knew that Spock’s mind was only half in it, but it didn’t matter. Even as he came, Jim could not stop thinking about the life growing inside him, and as he fell into a deep post-coital sleep, it was with his hand and Spock’s clasped over his belly.


	2. Xenogenetics

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jim, Spock, and McCoy have a conversation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for the comments/kudos! Just a short update, as I have zero spare time at the moment...

McCoy poured himself his third brandy of the evening. This life could drive a man to drink. If it wasn’t giant amoebas, radiation, or flintlock muskets, it was mind-transference and brain theft—on top of the thousand more banal ways the _Enterprise_ crew had found of landing themselves in his sickbay. Now Jim had managed to get himself knocked up, and by a half-Vulcan, no less—as if dealing with one crazy Vulcan hybrid wasn’t enough! But Jim seemed genuinely delighted, and that was a good thing. McCoy knew he was counting the days till this mission ended. He talked about _when_ he got the _Enterprise_ back, but McCoy knew it was far more a matter of _if_ , and it was eating at Jim. McCoy could see it in his blood pressure, in the way he closed down conversations, in the fact that Jim hadn’t really, properly smiled in the last six months. But today he’d shown Jim the wiggly line on the tricorder that was his baby’s heartbeat, and Jim had put his hand on his belly, right down low where his uterus was, and it was like the sun had come out from behind the clouds. Jim’s joy had been written all over his face—and, hell, he’d even got a little teary himself, because he loved Jim and Jim was going to be a daddy and he was _happy_.

McCoy brushed his teeth, changed into his pyjamas, and got into bed. Jim Kirk a daddy! Jim and Spock. How _did_ that work? Spock, he was pretty sure, had been conceived in a petri dish—if he wasn’t conceived inside a duotronic memory circuit, which was McCoy’s private theory. But it was a little late—and frankly he’d had a little too much to drink—to be puzzling out xenogenetics. He turned out the lights and rolled onto his side.

At least Jim made sense: Rutgers XY, a deliberate mutation introduced into the human genome during the Eugenics Wars. By modifying the expression of AMH and a few other tweaks, twenty-first-century scientists had managed to achieve the development of functional female reproductive organs alongside the normal male structures. Records from that period were pretty patchy, but according to one theory he’d read about at med school, male gestation was meant as a way of boosting Earth’s population after decades of war. According to another, the aim was to allow the Supermen to breed with each other, or even themselves, without needing to involve inferior—

McCoy felt suddenly cold. Was it possible Jim had impregnated _himself_? There had been cases of Rutgers men seeding themselves while masturbating—and Jim did have a bit of a record of getting himself duplicated, one way or another.

McCoy got out of bed and called up Jim’s scans on his personal terminal, but there was just nothing there to tell him whether the tiny eight-week foetus was human or part-Vulcan, and he could hardly go round to Jim’s cabin now, demanding a blood test.

_Damn._

He poured himself another brandy.

 

Jim woke at 6:08. It was the latest he’d slept in weeks—and he felt wonderful. He wasn’t nauseous, his body glowed with the aftermath of two amazing orgasms, and he was in Spock’s arms. The only discomfort was the twinge in his bladder, but he needed to pee because he was going to have a baby. Jim curled closer against Spock as the thrill shot through him all over again. They were going to have a _baby_.

Now Jim felt Spock’s hand drifting over his flank.

‘Hey.’ He pressed the word like a kiss to the soft skin behind Spock’s jaw. ‘I thought you’d be on the bridge, or in the lab.’

Spock was still stroking him—long lazy strokes from his shoulder to his hip. ‘My mate is pregnant,’ he said, the words a deep rumble in his chest that made Jim shiver. ‘My place is here.’

Jim laid his hand on Spock’s chest, absently circling one nipple. ‘We can’t just stay in bed for the next seven months.’

‘No. But we can, for the next seventeen-point-four minutes.’

Jim shivered again. ‘Seventeen-point-four, huh?’

Spock’s reply was to reach between their bodies and push down over Jim’s belly, over his full bladder, to his filling cock. If they were going to do _that_ , Jim thought, he was going to need the bathroom first. Then Spock claimed his mouth in a kiss—a searing, searching kiss that turned Jim’s insides to jelly. On second thoughts, he could wait seventeen minutes.

 

Fortunately the hyper-dense dust cloud proved just as uninteresting as Jim had anticipated, leaving Spock free for a meeting in the afternoon with Jim and McCoy. McCoy did not tell Jim the real reason he wanted more tests; ‘Just some baselines and the chance to give Spock my congratulations.’ They met in Jim’s cabin, for privacy. McCoy took a blood sample and ran it through his portable analyser. After just a minute the machine was pinging to signal that it had isolated foetal DNA and completed a partial sequence. McCoy read the summary, then scrolled through the first few pages of the full report, just to be sure. He had never been so happy to see Vulcan genes. When he turned to Jim and Spock he was grinning.

‘Well, Spock, this is about the last thing I ever thought I’d be saying, but you’re going to be a father—though quite how that happened I can’t explain. I’ve never quite understood how _you_ happened.’

Spock steepled his fingers. ‘As you know, doctor, there was an extensive scientific team involved in my conception and birth. Even so, as you say, it does not seem probable that a human and a Vulcan could successfully interbreed, even with assistance. The Vulcan genome is, however, unusually adaptable—and rather dominant, in combinations.’

McCoy eyed his pointed-eared friend. ‘You don’t say.’

Spock merely raised an eyebrow. ‘I also have a theory that the hybridizing capacity of various species is related to the Preservers’ intervention in humanoid development. The prevalence of diploid number forty-six, for example, far exceeds what we would expect of random chance.’

McCoy nodded thoughtfully. ‘Our friends the Preservers. That would explain a lot.’

‘And naturally the hybridizing potential is more pronounced in my own genome,’ Spock went on. ‘It is not statistically surprising that normal meiosis should have produced sperm capable of fertilising Jim’s ovum.’

‘So we got lucky,’ said Jim, who was starting to feel less like a parent-to-be and more like one of Spock’s research projects. But then Spock turned to him, amusement playing in his dark eyes.

‘Quite the opposite,’ he said. ‘I would estimate the odds of such a combination occurring at one in 364,722, which is rather less than the approximately fifteen billion sperm I introduced into you during my _pon farr_.’

‘Fifteen _billion_?’ Jim blinked.

‘Approximately.’

‘How romantic.’

‘All right, all right,’ said McCoy. ‘I shouldn’t have asked, though the two of you would certainly make a nice paper in the _Journal of Genetics_ —kidding,’ he added, when he saw the alarmed look in Jim’s eyes. ‘What I’m interested in is keeping Jim and the baby healthy. The fact that the pregnancy has come this far suggests to me that we won’t see any major problems, but I’m going to be monitoring you pretty closely, Jim—and, Spock, I’d like access to the full records on your birth, if possible. I guess that will mean informing your parents.’

‘I have access to the records,’ said Spock. ‘I will transfer them to your terminal. When Jim is ready, we will inform my parents.’

Jim took Spock’s hand. He knew Spock didn’t like to touch in front of other people, but this was Bones, and they were having a baby. ‘Do you think there will be problems, Bones?’

McCoy looked at his friend—his very male, starship-captain friend, who had fallen in love with his first officer and was now carrying his child. Jim looked more anxious than with a fleet of Romulans off his bow. ‘No, I don’t. Your body’s accepted the pregnancy. Everything’s looking good. But this is uncharted territory, and I want to be as prepared as I can be.’

Jim squeezed Spock’s hand. ‘Uncharted territory is our specialty.’

McCoy grinned. ‘You can say that again.’

‘There is one other matter, doctor,’ said Spock. ‘Jim has told me that he intends to remain in command of the _Enterprise_ until the conclusion of the mission. I believe that is unwise.’

‘Not necessarily,’ McCoy said guardedly. His gaze flicked between his two friends. He had the distinct sense of walking into an ambush. ‘Women commonly work up to the last weeks of pregnancy.’

‘Do they commonly command starships?’ Spock withdrew his hand from Jim’s and folded his arms across his chest. ‘Jim will be thirty weeks pregnant by the time we reach Earth. In the interim, he and the baby will be at risk from hostile forces, radiation surges, transporter malfunctions—’

‘God, Spock, we don’t know any of that’s going to happen!’ Jim was on his feet, staring at his lover.

‘All of it _has_ happened.’

‘And could happen anywhere. What do you want to do? Put me in cotton wool? It’s my ship, Spock, and my body.’

‘Your command is coming to an end,’ said Spock. ‘I am simply suggesting that you accelerate the process, in view of your pregnancy.’

‘And what if I never get another ship?’ Jim clutched the edge of the desk, needing physical contact with some part of the _Enterprise_. ‘What if these months are all I have?’ He looked to McCoy in appeal, as did Spock.

The doctor licked his lip nervously. ‘Much as I think we’re all crazy, being out here at all, I have to say I agree with you, Jim. A year ago, you’d have been out on your ear before you could say “ground assignment”. But, thanks to Commander Bel, pregnancy is now handled under the fitness and endangerment regulations, and at the moment there’s absolutely no reason for me to say you’re unfit for duty. Of course, that may change in five months’ time—but unless some particular medical problem arises, I don’t see why you shouldn’t be on the bridge when we dock.’  

Jim nodded. Commander Bel was the Andorian first officer of the _Lexington_ who had dragged Starfleet through the Interplanetary Court of Justice on discrimination charges when she was forced to leave her ship after becoming pregnant. Andorians had a gestation period close to two solar years, and prior to joining the Federation regularly continued in military service while pregnant. Bel had argued that requiring pregnant officers to take more than two years of leave would constitute discrimination based on species and an unfair impediment to career advancement, plus her legal team had been able to adduce a half-dozen other Federation species whose reproductive strategies were incompatible with existing regulations. Starfleet had been forced to change the rules and Bel had returned to her post three weeks before taking maternity leave and giving birth to a healthy child. She was due to return to service soon, and Jim made a mental note to send a stargram congratulating her. He had a lot to thank her for.

Spock, however, was not satisfied. ‘I am aware of the regulations,’ he said, ‘and Commander Bel’s case. However, I would contend that carrying an unborn child into potentially hostile conditions clearly constitutes endangerment—’

‘“Unnecessary or unreasonable endangerment of persons or property”,’ said Jim. He could quote regulations when he wanted to. ‘If being in space is unreasonable, what are any of us doing here? As for “unnecessary”, I can hardly leave the baby behind when I beam down somewhere.’

‘Ah, now landing parties might be another matter,’ said McCoy. ‘Command’s jumpy enough as it is about you putting yourself in the line of fire.’

‘And I’m happy to compromise there.’ Jim looked at his lover. ‘Hell, Spock, I want to keep this baby safe as much as you do. I’m just not ready to give up everything else, not yet.’

This time it was Spock who took Jim’s hand. ‘I know, beloved.’

_Beloved_. Coming from Spock, that was positively mushy, and McCoy took it as his signal to leave. ‘Well, if that’s sorted…’

Jim looked up. ‘Thank you, Bones.’

‘Indeed, Doctor.’

‘Oh, but how could I forget?’ McCoy brandished a hypo.

‘What’s that?’

‘Anti-nausea shot.’

Jim offered an arm. ‘Please.’

 

That night Jim and Spock ate in the mess. After the meal, Spock excused himself to attend to some gas spectrography results, leaving Jim chatting with Bones and Uhura.

When Jim returned to his cabin, he found the lights turned down low and a spray of white orchids on his desk. Flowers. No-one had ever given him flowers. Jim’s breath caught in his throat even as he wondered how he was ever going to explain them to his yeoman—or to the ship’s botanist.

There was movement, then, almost silent, and Jim closed his eyes. He did not need to ask whose were the arms that encircled him from behind.

‘I love you, Jim,’ Spock said seriously. ‘You make me—happy.’

For a while Jim’s only reply was a soft choking sound. Then he found Spock’s hand and held it tight. ‘I love you too,’ he whispered. ‘So much.’


	3. Discoveries

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jim has a check-up and joins Spock on a landing party.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all the comments and kudos - and apologies for being so slow in updating this story!

Six weeks later, McCoy was in the captain’s quarters for Jim’s regular check-up. McCoy pretended to grumble about making house-calls, but they’d agreed to keep the pregnancy under wraps for as long as possible. The crew didn’t even know about Jim’s relationship with Spock, and McCoy didn’t need any persuading that spending the last months of his captaincy as the hottest topic in ship’s gossip would not be in the patient’s best interests. So it had been more or less business as usual, aside from Jim’s new hands-off approach to landing parties and vastly improved mood. Jim was, as they used to say, glowing.

‘You’re the picture of health,’ McCoy pronounced. ‘Both of you.’

‘I don’t _look_ pregnant.’ Jim rubbed his stomach.

‘And you probably won’t for a while yet. Your uterus is tucked in behind a pretty respectable set of abdominal muscles—and you’ve got more room to play with than the average woman. But believe me, Jim, that baby’s growing. Sooner or later you’re going to be complaining about backaches and stretch marks, don’t you worry.’

Jim grimaced.

‘You should be able to feel it, though.’

‘The baby?’

‘Well, your uterus.’ McCoy gestured to the bed. ‘Get your pants down and try to relax.’

Jim did as he was told. McCoy laid a hand low on his belly, and pressed firmly. ‘Relax, I said! That’s better. Now put your hand where mine is. Feel it?’

‘What am I feeling for?’

‘The grapefruit.’

Jim laughed when he found it. He relaxed his stomach as much as possible and traced the shape of the firm ball. ‘It’s really there.’

‘Sure is—and it’s going to be the size of a watermelon by the time the baby’s born.’

Jim sat up and fastened his trousers, wondering how he was ever going to fit a watermelon in there. ‘So, as I’m only currently carrying a grapefruit around, would you have any medical objections to me beaming down to have a look at these ruins?’

McCoy sat back. ‘Not if Spock says it checks out, no.’

‘And who exactly is captain of this ship?’ Jim shook his head, smiling. ‘He couldn’t find so much as an insect to stop me going down there. And I think he looked pretty hard.’

‘In that case, my medical opinion is that the fresh air will do you good.’

‘Thanks, Bones.’ Jim was already at the door.

‘Oh, and Jim? Bring Spock to the office some time, and we’ll take a peek, if you like.’

Jim’s tone, when he replied, betrayed none of the thrill that shot through him at that thought. ‘I will.’

 

In the turbo to the transporter room Jim had to resist the temptation to feel for his uterus again. Usually, when he was on duty, he could almost forget the secret growing in his belly. Now, however, when Yeoman Marks got in on Deck 8, Jim felt as if she should be able to hear his thoughts: he was pregnant; his baby was healthy and growing fast; and soon—perhaps tonight—he would see him or her for first time. But Marks only nodded a quick ‘Captain’, and Jim smiled and returned the greeting before stepping out of the lift.

Kyle was at the transporter controls. ‘Good afternoon, sir,’ he said pleasantly. If he was surprised to see his captain in the transporter room with a communicator at his hip, he gave no hint of it.

‘I feel like stretching my legs,’ Jim said casually. Of course he didn’t have to say anything, but he hated the feeling of being less than honest with his crew—even if his recent policy of ‘giving his officers more landing-party experience’ was what Command had long desired. ‘I hear Mr Spock’s team has found some pretty spectacular ruins. Can you put me down near their position?’

‘Aye sir.’

Jim materialized in a scrubby field. Thirty meters away he saw Ensign Ferris bending over a scraggly plant. The rest of the team was out of sight, hidden among the weathered buildings that loomed over the arid landscape.

‘Ensign.’

‘Captain!’

Jim grimaced. No starship crewmember should startle so easily. ‘Can you point me in Mr Spock’s direction?’

‘He was working near Building B, sir.’ Ferris pointed. ‘That one.’

Jim found Spock on the eastern side of the structure, tricorder in hand.

‘Captain.’

Jim was amused to see the combination of affection and disapproval in Spock’s eyes.

‘Mr Spock. I’ve read your preliminary report—and discussed it with Doctor McCoy,’ Jim added meaningfully. ‘Sounds like the sort of place I should see for myself.’

‘Indeed.’ Spock’s tone suggested he really would have preferred to keep his mate in cotton wool. Jim made a mental note to tell Spock just how illogical that was—ideally after screwing him silly, which was usually the best time for winning an argument. Jim smiled to himself. ‘So, what are we looking at?’

‘This appears to have been a meeting hall or gathering place. Lieutenant Giuffre has noted some resemblance to the public temples of Sicyon IV; however, these structures seem to have been entirely secular in purpose.’

‘You mentioned paintings,’ said Jim. ‘Can we go inside?’

Spock nodded and led the way into the stone structure.

It took Jim’s eyes a moment to adjust to the dim light. When they did, what he saw was breathtaking. The walls were covered with frescoes of humanoid figures and other creatures—‘mythical beasts’ was the phrase that came to Jim’s mind, but perhaps this planet once had been home to creatures like griffins and unicorns. The colours had faded with the passage of millennia, but the images were still distinct, and even shimmered where some sort of silicate was mixed into the pigments.

‘And you wanted me to miss this?’ Jim whispered. Perhaps it was his hormones playing up, but Jim felt deeply moved by this delicate relic of a long-dead world. In an ideal universe, Jim would have kissed Spock then and there beneath the ancient paintings. As it was, he settled for brushing his hand lightly against his lover’s. ‘It’s beautiful. What happened to them?’

‘Our studies point to a catastrophic climatic event, approximately eight millennia ago. There are several large meteor craters in the southern hemisphere. I think it likely that dust generated by a major meteor strike obliterated their food sources, along with many other species planetwide. Our surveys have detected very little variety of flora and fauna, compared with what we see in the paintings. Lieutenant Giuffre is taking stratigraphic samples; however, further study will be necessary to provide decisive answers. I would recommend the dispatch of a long-term research team.’

‘I agree,’ said Jim. But he was not thinking of the report he would send to Starfleet, or the competition that would no doubt ensue, from Federation scientists and archaeologists wanting to study this planet. He turned on the spot, eyes trained on the walls above him. Not only mythical creatures but lush forests and groves graced the ancient space—a far cry from the arid grassland that now surrounded it. ‘It was a paradise.’

Spock kept near to him. Jim suspected he too was moved by the fate of these people and their world. ‘This building appears to have fallen out of use before the crisis came. There are other smaller buildings to the east of our position. The wall paintings there are rather cruder, but point to the beginnings of famine, and war.’

‘And all this vanished.’ Jim turned to Spock. ‘I… don’t think I want to see that just now.’

‘Then let me show you something else.’

Spock led Jim to the far end of the hall and down a flight of steps which descended through a stone arch below the floor-level of the building. Spock held a field lamp to light the way.

‘The steps are very dusty—’

‘I’m fine, Spock.’

Jim forgot his momentary annoyance as they emerged into a low space with an arched ceiling and a pool in the center, which must have been fed by a natural spring. As his eyes again adjusted, he was struck anew by just how privileged he was to be part of such discoveries. Jim had been to Ravenna once, to see the mosaics—the last great relics of the Roman Empire in the west. He had stood in the Mausoleum of Galla Placidia and stared bewitched at the ceiling—a dome of deep blue and gold stars that still shone as brightly as they had eighteen centuries earlier. Jim could no longer remember the saints and apostles who had peered down from the vaulted walls, but he remembered the beauty and the sense of reverence and awe of stepping back in time into someone else’s world. He felt it now as he took the last few steps down into the low cavern. As in Ravenna, the walls were covered in mosaics—all rich blues and greens, with the same griffins he’d seen in the hall, and delicate deer-like creatures with young at their feet. And here too the ceiling was covered in stars, each with a faceted crystal at its center, that reflected the light from Spock’s lamp into the pool below. But the pattern was not geometric, as in Galla’s tomb. These stars were carefully depicted in different sizes and colors, with fine lines of shimmering gold tracing connections between them.

‘Constellations,’ Jim breathed.

‘Yes. I believe these mosaics represent the sky as seen at the spring equinox, some eight thousand years ago.’

Jim stepped further into the cavern, taking in the walls, the ceiling, the spring, luminous with a hundred points of light. Spock had said the hall was secular in function. Jim’s intuition told him there was something different, something spiritual about this space, yet there was no one image he could pick out as a cultic symbol—unless these people worshipped a pantheon of forest creatures. ‘What is this place?’

 ‘Unknown; however, the imagery and the astrological date suggest a concern with fertility. The presence of the spring would also fit that theory.’

Jim looked again at the mosaics. Spock was right: there were images of new life everywhere, from the deer with their fawns to the fruit-laden vines that decorated the edges of each wall. Fertility cults were among the most common in the galaxy. Perhaps this was a place where people came to offer prayers for the harvest, or for children. Unconsciously, Jim laid a hand on his stomach.

Behind him, Spock stepped closer, close enough that Jim was aware of his body-warmth. ‘How was your meeting with Doctor McCoy?’ he asked quietly.

Spock saw Jim’s cheek firm in a smile. ‘We’re both well.’ Jim turned then, and dared to take Spock’s hand. ‘But there’s something I’d like to do tonight.’

 

It was 22:30, ship’s time, and sickbay was deserted. The lights came up automatically as McCoy led Jim and Spock into the private consulting room.

‘In the unlikely event that some ensign shows up with a hangnail, the two of you sit tight in here. Now, Jim, if I can have you on the bed, let’s take a look at this baby.’

Jim lay down and unfastened his trousers while McCoy adjusted the scanner. Jim was aware of his heart beating too rapidly. Spock must have noticed his nerves, for he settled one hand on Jim’s shoulder in an uncharacteristic gesture. Jim glanced up with an embarrassed smile.

‘Right.’ McCoy swung the scanner arm over Jim’s belly. ‘Are you ready?’

‘Yes.’

McCoy flicked a switch and something appeared on the viewscreen above the bed. At first Jim couldn’t tell what he was looking at; then McCoy repositioned the scanner and the fetus appeared in high-resolution, digitally-enhanced color. His baby was still smaller than his fist, yet already he could see perfect little fingers and toes and tiny, pointed ears. _Spock’s ears._

Jim fumbled for Spock’s hand and found it. ‘That’s our baby.’

‘Yes,’ Spock said thickly, and Jim knew he was struggling to maintain emotional control.

McCoy grinned. ‘Even I have to admit that’s a pretty cute little baby. Despite the ears.’ He moved the scanner again, to a front-on view. ‘Are you sure you don’t want to know the gender?’

‘I can see the gender,’ said Spock. ‘However, I respect Jim’s wish to “be surprised”.’

Jim looked up at him, then back to the screen. ‘Now I feel like I’m missing something.’

Neither Spock nor McCoy said anything.

‘I suppose I can’t keep saying “it”.’

Still nothing.

‘Well?’

‘Well, what do you think, Jim?’ said McCoy. He was obviously enjoying himself.

Jim studied the image. ‘I’d say… a girl.’

Spock and McCoy glanced at each other.

‘Yes, Jim,’ said Spock. ‘This is our daughter.’

‘A little girl…’ Jim squeezed his mate’s hand. ‘She’s perfect, Spock.’


	4. Family

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jim thinks about his future family, and the _Enterprise_ prepares to welcome some unusual passengers.

The _Enterprise_ remained in orbit around Tau Sigma V another three days, cataloguing the ruins and conducting scientific surveys. Giuffre found extensive animal remains preserved in an ash fall that seemed to confirm Spock’s meteor theory. Then Sulu’s party discovered a remnant of the humanoid population living in the polar latitudes, well above where anyone had expected to find sentient life, which transformed the situation. After meeting with all department heads, Jim decided to pull his teams out and refer their discoveries to the Federation’s Ethics Council. He filed a report to that effect, and launched a subspace beacon, which would mark the planet as quarantined under the non-interference directive.

Before breaking orbit, Jim and Spock beamed down to the ruins one more time, to confirm the site was clean. For a few minutes they stood together in the large meeting hall. It was late afternoon, and the shaft of light from the entry highlighted a group of painted figures standing under a striped canopy. They were clad in loose, colorful robes, some decorated with jewels or embroidery—a far cry from the skin-wearing nomads Sulu had found in the north.

‘I don’t think I’ll ever forget this place,’ Jim said softly. ‘I hope, someday, these people have a chance to enjoy their heritage.’

‘They have survived, Jim. I expect they will continue to do so.’

Jim smiled. ‘Let’s leave them to it.’

 

Over the following weeks, the _Enterprise_ proceeded to survey a series of other, less interesting planets. In the quiet moments, Jim let his mind wander to the little girl growing in his belly. Seeing his baby on McCoy’s scanner had made his pregnancy seem real in a way that it hadn’t, quite, before. In just a few months he and Spock were going to have a baby, a daughter, and their lives would change forever. He wasn’t worried about the birth—that, as Bones had said, was the easy part. A caesarean took five minutes; it was the next twenty years that had Jim wondering. What would life be like when he had traded his ship for a family? How would he handle a screaming baby—or an obstreperous teenager? Would he be a good parent? And would he ever sail the stars again? His heart raced sometimes when he thought about it. Yet none of his doubts could shake the wonder and excitement he felt when he imagined holding his baby, or watching Spock playing with their little girl. He might leave the stars behind, but there was another universe of experiences to explore, of first words and first steps, camping holidays and homework—maybe even another baby. Jim imagined hiking in a forest—a tall pine forest—with Spock beside him, a toddler strapped to his back, and their little girl holding hands between them. He could almost smell the pine needles crackling underfoot, hear his daughter’s excited squeal as a squirrel darted along a low branch—

‘Captain, our scan of sector six is complete; assuming synchronous orbit over sector seven now.’

‘Very good, Mr Spock.’ Jim glanced at Spock by the science station, then refocused his gaze on the ice-bound planet on the main viewscreen. The bridge monitors blinked and blipped; the environmental systems quietly circulated recycled air, yet Jim could not quite shake the imagined scent of pine resin. Sometimes, home held more wonders than uncharted worlds.

 

That evening, Jim and Spock met for their usual Thursday night chess game, as they had for nearly five years. It was over the chessboard that they’d really got to know each other. Later, it had become a subterfuge, when their relationship was new and they couldn’t ‘keep out of each other’s pants’, as Jim put it. But they’d soon found they missed the chess, and the conversation. Now, inevitably, their talk often turned to Jim’s pregnancy, and their impending parenthood.

Jim toyed with a rook, captured three moves earlier. ‘I had a… a daydream, I suppose, this afternoon. We were hiking somewhere—the Rockies, maybe. You, me, and the kids.’

Spock had been about to pin Jim’s queen, but waited. ‘Kids?’

‘I know.’ Jim shook his head, smiling. ‘Getting ahead of myself. I don’t know how I’ll cope with one, yet! I guess I was thinking about me and Sam.’ Jim set the rook down. It was his brother who’d taught him chess—and a lot more besides, like free climbing, building fires, and how to bypass the security on their mother’s aircar. He looked up. ‘I know your experience was different.’

Spock’s eyes seemed to be trained on something beyond the bulkhead. ‘My mother wanted another child. It did not prove possible.’

‘I didn’t know that. I’m sorry.’ Jim laid his hand lightly on Spock’s elbow. ‘What about you? Would you have liked to have a brother or sister?’

‘Yes,’ Spock replied, after a pause. ‘Besides the natural affection between siblings, I believe I would have valued the… shared experience.’

Jim knew Spock meant the experience of being half-human among Vulcans. Rage sparked within him, as it always did when he thought of the scorn and the bigotry that Spock had been subjected to, even from his own family. He wouldn’t let the same thing happen to his daughter. ‘She’s going to be so loved, Spock,’ he said aloud.

Spock reached across to stroke the tense line of his mate’s jaw. ‘I know, Jim. I am home, here. With you.’

 

Two months remained in the _Enterprise_ ’s mission. Jim was well into his second trimester, and increasingly aware of his expanding uterus. Still, he noticed his clothes not fitting before he noticed anything in the mirror. His trousers began to feel uncomfortably tight, and his tunics tugged across the front. For a while he tolerated it, until one morning he struggled to fasten his trousers at all. Possibly that had something to do with Scotty’s birthday dinner the night before; nonetheless, it felt like a milestone.

‘Spock!’ he called from the sleeping alcove.

Spock had spent the night in Jim’s cabin. Now he hurried from the bathroom, half shaved. ‘Is something wrong?’

Jim displayed the gape in his fly. ‘Can’t do them up!’

Jim’s obvious joy nullified Spock’s irritation at his temporary (and probably unwarranted) alarm. He placed his palm over the triangle of exposed flesh. ‘Shall I contact the quartermaster?’

‘No need.’ Jim went to the closet, where he had a few old uniforms put away from his heavier days. He pulled out a pair of trousers. ‘I hoped never to need these again, but now I’m happy to.’ Jim quickly exchanged the too-tight trousers for the other pair. They were actually a little loose on his trim-but-pregnant form. Jim smoothed down his wrap tunic—he’d let it out a little—then laughed when he saw Spock sporting almost exactly half a five-o’clock shadow. ‘You might want to finish in the bathroom.’

‘Indeed.’ Spock was suppressing a sexual response. He found his mate’s growing body intensely erotic, as he had demonstrated the night before—but, with a briefing starting in fifteen minutes, there was no time for a reprise.

 

Jim was genuinely excited about the _Enterprise_ ’s next assignment, even though it involved two of his least favorite activities: ferrying passengers and liaising with bureaucrats.

The other officers were already assembled when Jim and Spock arrived—though Scotty looked a little the worse for wear after the previous night’s celebrations. Jim took his seat, grateful that he’d spent the evening only pretending to drink Scotty’s whisky. ‘Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. If we can get started, I hope you’ll find this mission as stimulating as I expect to.’

Spock outlined the situation on Arval II—a colony planet home to both mining and agricultural interests. The mining company in question had recently discovered a new dilithium deposit and begun to exploit it; the deposit had the potential not only to make the colony self-sufficient in energy, but also to supply ships in a sector remote from other dilithium supplies. However, the location of the deposit and the intensive techniques necessary to extract the crystals had the agricultural consortium up in arms. There had been complaints of subsidence and water contamination, while vibrations from the mining operation were impacting on the lives of the colonists and had even caused property damage in the main settlement. Neither side was prepared to give up its interests, nor was the Federation willing to lose either a strategically-important colony or a new source of dilithium. The result had been escalating tensions and even flashes of violence while planetary administrators worked to find a solution.

‘And let me guess,’ said McCoy. ‘We have to solve all their problems and make them play nice.’

‘No, Doctor. A Federation team sent three months ago has already identified a solution.’ Indeed, Spock had acted as advisor to that team. ‘Our task is to implement it.’

‘Oh, joy,’ said the doctor. ‘And just what do we have to do?’

Jim leaned forward in his seat, taking in Scott, Uhura, and Sulu as well. ‘What tunnels faster than a Minetrax 5000 and creates zero vibrations?’

McCoy folded as his arms as a slow smile spread over his face. ‘A Horta.’

‘Six Horta, to be precise,’ said Spock.

‘And our job,’ Jim explained, ‘is to transport the volunteers. They’ll spend two years on the planet, tunneling out a matrix, and fattening up, in the process; then the miners can go in and collect the crystals, with no need for explosives and no disruption to the colony.’

‘And the Horta are happy about this?’ McCoy asked,

‘Indeed, Doctor,’ said Spock, ‘I believe they are most enthusiastic.’

‘Ha!’ McCoy grinned. ‘Like kids at summer camp.’

Jim smiled and turned to his other officers. ‘Mr Chekov, if you’ll lay in a course for Janus VI, our passengers are expecting us in four days’ time. Scotty, that means we’ve got some work to do to make our guests feel at home. Spock, you’re in charge of provisioning—and liaising with the Horta, until we can get the translator working. Uhura, I hope you’re up for the challenge.’

‘It’s a privilege, sir.’

 

Jim watched from the observation bay as the tractor beam pulled hundreds of tonnes of pulverized rock into the _Enterprise_ ’s hangar deck. The shuttlecraft had been stowed at the back of the bay, behind a temporary partition. Then, to Scotty’s dismay, Jim had ordered the rest of the deck flooded with a removable plasticrete resin, to make it acid-resistant. They couldn’t afford to risk a hungry young Horta inadvertently tunneling through the deck plates. Jim could still see odd patches of the pink resin showing through the crushed rock. They disappeared when the beam pulled in the next load, including a few larger chunks, each about the size of a shuttlecraft.

‘I hope they like asteroid,’ Jim said to Spock.

‘The mineral content of this debris field closely matches the Horta’s native environment. I believe they will find it acceptable.’

‘I didn’t doubt it for a minute.’ Jim put his hands behind his head and stretched. Something in his neck popped, which drew a solicitous look from Spock. ‘Just stiff,’ Jim explained. ‘Long day. In fact, I’m about ready for something to eat myself, once we’re done here.’

Spock inclined his head. ‘I will join you.’

 

They collected their meals from the mess and took them to Jim’s quarters. Jim ate quickly; lunch had been a few nutricubes at his desk, and he was starving. He had polished off his lasagna and the fruit plate he’d meant to share by the time Spock had finished his salad.

‘I assume Doctor McCoy has informed you that you are not, in fact, “eating for two”?’

‘Bones says my weight’s spot on. I’m in better shape now than I was two years ago.’

‘I know, Jim.’

Spock’s eyes shone with affection. It was just his attempts at humour, Jim decided, that needed improvement. Jim pushed his tray aside and leaned back in his chair. His neck was still bothering him; maybe he’d prevail on Spock for a massage later—now, massages Spock had down to an art form. But for the moment Jim was thinking about the six shaggy passengers due to come aboard the next morning. Spock had beamed down to the mining colony that afternoon to finalize arrangements with Vanderberg and the mother Horta. They’d use the ship’s transporters to send the young Horta directly to the hangar deck, and repeat the process once they reached Arval. Scotty had already conducted tests on cement blocks, just to be sure the transporters could handle that volume of what was essentially solid rock. Everything checked out, and the mother Horta had communicated her final approval through an amusingly colloquial ‘A-OK’ etched into a concrete slab on Janus’ new twenty-fifth level. Jim was still amazed at her goodwill after the incident three years earlier—even more so, now that he was carrying a child of his own. He was looking forward to meeting her children.

‘Are they really ready for this, do you think?’ he asked Spock over herbal tea—he hated the stuff, but the baby had forced him to cut back on his coffee intake. ‘They’re only three years old. Are they ready to be separated from their mother? Is she ready?’

‘Yes, Jim. The young Horta hatch fully sentient and largely self-sufficient. They receive ongoing education and guidance from their nest-mother, but are also accustomed to spend long periods away from the nest tunneling. At three solar years, they are quite ready for this mission. Indeed, the mother Horta believes it will be an invaluable experience.’ Spock tilted his head to one side. ‘We did discuss this.’

‘I know.’ Jim looked down and smiled. ‘I suppose I’ve been thinking a lot about… family, recently.’

‘As have I.’

Spock’s voice was wonderfully deep. Jim could imagine he felt it in the core of his soul. Maybe that was what family meant: that sense of connection; that completeness he never thought he’d have—him, Spock, and the child he carried. Jim curled his hands around his tea cup and they sat for a while in quiet companionship of thought.

‘Do you think we’ll ever see a Horta in Starfleet?’ he said eventually.

Spock’s mouth quirked at the corner. ‘Perhaps. But the Horta realize their planet’s resources are finite. If their species is to continue in the long term, they will need to colonize other worlds. They see partnerships, such as that on Arval, as one means of doing so.’

‘The Federation would help them, without expecting anything in return.’

‘Indeed. However, I believe the Horta genuinely wish to… make themselves useful.’

‘An admirable attitude.’ Jim rolled his shoulders. It wasn’t supposed to be a hint—not consciously, at least—but Spock took it anyway. He came around behind Jim’s chair and began to work over Jim’s neck and shoulders. Jim sighed and closed his eyes as the tension melted out of him. It always gave him a thrill to think that Spock could render him unconscious—kill him, even—with just a touch of those talented fingers. Instead, he found out the knots and banished them more effectively than any of McCoy’s pills.

‘Oh god, that’s better than sex,’ Jim groaned.

‘So you have said, and yet your actions suggest otherwise.’

Jim chuckled, and arched into Spock’s touch. Spock tried to probe lower, but the chair was in the way.

‘Perhaps if you were to lie down?’

Jim pulled off his shirt and lay on the bed while Spock worked methodically down the line of his spine, all the way to his hips. Jim groaned and twisted under Spock’s touch. He hadn’t realized how sore he was there.

‘You are unusually tense, Jim.’

Jim’s reply was muffled by the pillow.

‘I could not make that out.’

Jim flopped over onto his back, enjoying his new-found laxity. ‘I said, I could blame the baby, but I think this comes from Horta-proofing a ship in three days.’

Spock was fairly sure that was not what Jim had said. What he had heard sounded more like a series of expletives—but he supposed the sentiment was close enough.

‘Stay tonight?’

Spock looked down at his mate. Jim’s hair was rumpled from the pillow, his pupils huge in the dim light—‘irresistible’ was not quite hyperbole. ‘You… require rest,’ he said uncertainly.

‘Yeah.’ Jim grabbed Spock’s hand and tugged him down onto the bed. ‘Later.’

 

Spock woke at 02:47. He did not know what had roused him, but he sensed that Jim was awake. He rolled onto his left side, so he was curled against Jim.

‘Are you awake?’ Jim said softly.

‘Yes.’

‘Give me your hand.’

Jim guided Spock’s hand to the side of his belly and held his breath.

‘Can you feel it?’

‘Uncertain.’ Spock pressed a little more firmly, and then he felt it—faint movement from inside Jim’s womb. ‘Yes,’ he whispered.

‘She’s kicking, Spock.’ Jim’s chest heaved with a deep breath. ‘I thought I felt it a couple of times, but I wasn’t sure.’ He tightened his hand over Spock’s. ‘Our baby’s kicking.’

It was a thoroughly ordinary thing, Spock thought. It was only chance that Jim had just now noticed the baby’s movements—and how many billions of trillions of parents had had marked the same moment? Yet, the fact that it was _their_ baby—his and Jim’s—made it extraordinary. He nuzzled into Jim’s neck and kissed him.

‘I love you, Jim.’

It was what he felt. It was not illogical to say it.


	5. Six little Horta

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Horta come aboard the _Enterprise_.

Jim monitored from the transporter room as the Horta came on board, three at a time. He saw their shapes shimmer on the pads before disappearing again to materialize on the hangar deck. The whine faded and Jim leaned across Scotty to hit the intercom.

‘Mr Spock, are our guests aboard?’

‘Indeed, sir—transport completed safely.’

‘Excellent. Please convey my greetings and make sure they’re comfortable.’

‘I shall. I will also relay a message to the mother.’

‘No need. I’m beaming down to the station. I’ll tell her myself.’

Spock’s slight hesitation betrayed his annoyance at the surprise announcement. ‘Very well, Captain.’

‘Be prepared to leave orbit in thirty minutes.’ Jim closed the link and stepped up onto the transporter pad. ‘If you would, Mr Scott?’

 

Jim stooped as he made his way through the tunnels of the twenty-fifth level. He remembered the close air and the acid tang from last time—then he heard it, that deep, purring, sibilating sound, as if the rock itself were breathing, and she was there, waiting for him in the wider area formed at the junction of two tunnels. The colored areas on her body pulsed, and her shaggy fringes—sense organs, he now knew—waved expectantly.

She was smaller than he remembered, and still scarred where his phaser had carved into her, yet he sensed only goodwill from this extraordinary being.

Jim lowered himself onto one knee. ‘Hello, Inala.’ It was her name, Spock had learned, as close as a human could say it. ‘Your children are safely aboard my ship.’

‘I am pleased,’ she told him—a female voice supplied by the translator over the Horta’s natural subsonic tones.

‘We’re very pleased, too—on the _Enterprise_ , and on Arval. I promise you, we’ll take good care of them.’

‘I know that you will,’ said Inala, and Jim wondered yet again at her magnanimity. ‘I hope that they are not too naughty.’

Jim smiled to hear a Horta use that word; smiled to think that they would soon have that connection between them, the common experience of parenthood. For a moment he thought of telling this being what he had told no-one besides Spock and Bones—but he had not come to speak of himself, his one child beside so many lost. ‘I can’t imagine it,’ he said instead. ‘And, if I’m wrong, many of us are—or will be—parents. We’ll call it good practice.’

The Horta shuffled back and forwards slightly, as if by way of a nod.

Jim shifted his weight onto the other knee. ‘Inala, there’s something I’ve wanted to say for a long time. In the history of my planet, before we travelled to the stars, first encounters with new peoples too often ended in death, violence, destruction. Ignorance and misunderstanding could be as dangerous as malice. We like to think we’ve moved beyond that, but unfortunately that’s not always true, as we proved here, three years ago. I hope I can say we’ve learned from that experience. I hope I have. But I know that I’m sorry, for the destruction and the sorrow that we caused.’

Inala shuffled again. ‘We are grateful for your words, and for the words of Spock, and Vanderberg, and your Federation. We will mourn the misunderstanding in the chronicle of the ages. But we do not regret our encounter with your people, for we would not otherwise know humans and Vulcans, and my children would not travel with you among the stars.’

‘I’m glad of that, too,’ said Jim. As a Starfleet officer, he supposed he should lament the compromised contact. The Horta had never developed warp technology and ipso facto would have fallen under the non-interference directive, if their encounter with the miners hadn’t forced the issue. As things were, Jim—and the majority of the Federation Council—felt that assisting the Horta was the least they could do, and Spock, for one, believed the Horta were advanced in ways that the Federation’s development scale did not comprehend. As Jim knelt before Inala, he could only agree. She had lived peacefully beneath the rocks since a time when his own ancestors were dwelling in caves and fighting Neanderthals. The Horta might not have invented the warp-drive, but when it came to intelligence and compassion, he suspected, they left humans far behind.

 

Three days later, the _Enterprise_ was en route to Arval II and the six young Horta were settling in well to life on a starship. Getting the universal translator working, however, was presenting some teething-problems.

Jim headed down to the hangar deck in the afternoon for a progress report. He was mildly alarmed to see several containers of thermo-concrete stacked outside the bay doors—the same stuff McCoy had used to patch up Inala’s injury three years ago. He hoped no one had been hurt. But the reason became clear when he entered the hangar: several areas were now covered with concrete, with various words and diagrams etched into them. One appeared to be a directional representation, in three dimensions. Acid-etching cement may not have been the most efficient means of communicating, Jim thought, but the thinking behind it was clearly sophisticated.

Spock and Uhura were sitting on a chunk of asteroid, attempting to converse with one of the Horta. Jim smiled as he always did when he saw them. The young Horta were about three feet long and less brightly colored than the mother. They reminded Jim of oversized terrapins.

Spock and Uhura began to rise at his approach, but Jim waved a hand and crouched beside them instead. ‘Good afternoon, everyone.’ Jim didn’t know if the Horta would be able to hear or understand him, but it didn’t hurt to try. ‘How are you getting on?’

The translator responded with a mass of words, as if the Horta had just given him half a dozen answers at the same time. All he could make out were the words ‘excited’ and ‘adventure’—but at least it was a happy cacophony.

 ‘We believe we now understand the problem,’ said Spock. ‘The Hortan language employs what are known as verbal chords, a somewhat rare linguistic form unreproducible by most humanoid life. In essence, where we might use a series of words, or a single complex word, the Horta use several words at once, to create different shades of meaning.’

‘Like musical chords,’ said Jim.

Uhura nodded. ‘It’s quite beautiful, sir—almost like language in three dimensions.’

‘Indeed,’ Spock agreed. ‘Unfortunately, the results produced by our translator are less agreeable. Its algorithms struggle to combine the chord elements into translatable sense units.’

‘So, why wasn’t this happening with Inala?’

‘We know that she was able to absorb certain elements of our language even from a light-mind touch, hence the initial written message that you and I observed. The subsequent meld will have provided fuller understanding. I believe that the universal translator performed better with Inala than with these individuals because she was already, in effect, translating her thoughts and language into forms compatible with our own.’

‘So, she was dumbing it down for us.’

‘Essentially.’

Jim smiled. He wasn’t in the least offended—or surprised.

‘And that’s why we seem to have gone backwards, sir,’ said Uhura. ‘Inala shared some of our concepts with the babies, but not enough for the translator to work reliably—not without a lot of reprogramming, and I don’t know if we’re going to be able to do that, before we reach Arval.’

‘We don’t want any misunderstandings,’ said Jim. He dreaded to think of the young Horta inadvertently _eating_ the dilithium crystals—or worse. ‘So, what do we do?’ he added, though he suspected he already knew the answer.

‘I propose to use the mind-meld again,’ said Spock. ‘Once these Horta have an understanding of our language forms, it should be possible for them to moderate their communications with us, as their nest-mother does.’

‘You’re going to meld with all of them?’

‘That should not be necessary. I expect that the Horta will be able to share the necessary information among themselves. If not, I will meld with all of them.’

‘Are they comfortable with that?’ Jim looked at the Horta patiently purring at Spock’s feet.

‘I believe so.’

‘Actually, I think there was a bit of competition, sir,’ Uhura added, ‘to be the one to meld with Mr Spock.’

Jim looked at him. ‘And are you comfortable with that?’

‘Yes.’ Spock’s eyes shone with one of his not-smiles, just for Jim. ‘As I believe I told you once, I find the Hortan mind most refreshing—after long exposure to humans.’

‘Then please carry on,’ Jim said, and stood up—then blacked out, dizzy. He stumbled backwards before catching himself. As his vision cleared, he saw Spock already at his elbow and Uhura on her feet as well.

‘Jim, are you all right?’ Only Uhura’s presence restrained Spock from grabbing hold of Jim physically.

‘I’m fine. Just lost my footing for a moment.’ Jim toed a piece of gravel and smiled, casual, as if he hadn’t just nearly fainted on the hangar deck. ‘Carry on. I’ll be on the bridge if you need me.’

Spock looked like he was about to protest, but Jim strode off before he had the chance. It was a shame, Jim thought; he would have liked to be there for the meld. Served him right for standing up too quickly.

 

Bones confirmed that was all it was. Jim dropped by his office on the way to dinner and let the doctor give him a quick once-over, just to keep Spock off his back.

‘Orthostatic hypotension, if you want the fancy name. Nothing to worry about. I’d be more concerned if your blood pressure was up. Take things slowly, and you shouldn’t have any problems—but let me know if you do.’

‘Thanks, Bones.’ Jim stood, slowly this time.

‘You know, I think you’re getting a bit of a tum,’ said McCoy.

Jim smiled and touched his stomach. ‘She’s been kicking, too.’

‘I was going to ask. Must feel pretty special.’

‘Mm-hmm.’

McCoy moved towards the door, but Jim was still standing at the desk. ‘Something else bothering you?’

‘No… Only, something Spock and I were talking about a while back.’

McCoy waited.

‘Do you think I could have another baby? Hypothetically,’ Jim added, before Bones could remind him he was only twenty-three weeks with number one. ‘Spock said his mother couldn’t.’

McCoy leaned back to perch on a cupboard. ‘Whole different kettle of fish. Sarek’s full Vulcan. Conceiving Spock needed a lot of intervention. You two did this naturally.’

Jim smiled to himself. Spock had told him once that their minds were unusually compatible; that it was inevitable, in a way, that they were drawn to each other. It seemed right that their bodies were compatible, too. ‘Would we have to wait seven years?’

‘No, Vulcans are fertile outside of _pon farr_. It really depends on you—for all I know, you could get regular periods from now on, or it could be that you only come into season when Spock does. If that’s the case, I can give you hormones to stimulate ovulation.’

Jim was staring. ‘Periods.’

‘And if it happens, we can sort that, too.’ McCoy clapped his friend on the shoulder. ‘Come on, let’s get something to eat.’

 

The following day, thanks to Spock’s efforts, Jim had the opportunity to converse properly with the young Horta for the first time. He sat on a convenient lump of rock with Envor, as he called himself—the same individual who had melded with Spock. As Envor described life on Janus, and the excitement he and the others felt at travelling to a new world, Jim was conscious of just how privileged he was to encounter and to get to know truly new forms of life. It was also delightful to realize that the Horta’s strangely formal, almost poetic mode of speaking was not a quirk of the mind-meld or the universal translator or Inala alone but something characteristic of the Hortan mind. Jim wasn’t surprised to learn that the Horta had a strong tradition of what the translator rendered as ‘epic poetry’—like the ancient Greeks, and countless other cultures, the Horta preserved their history in long epics, passed orally (or the Hortan equivalent) from one generation to the next; what Inala had called the ‘chronicle of the ages’. It was an unwritten tradition, but a remarkably complex and accurate one, as far as Jim could tell, as if each individual formed part of a blockchain of their species’ history. Uhura, apparently, was working with two of the other Horta on a translation of some core episodes in Hortan epic. Jim was keen to hear the results.

The Horta were also naturally inquisitive. Envor asked endless questions about the _Enterprise_ , Arval, and the humans around them. Jim answered them all as best he could, but one question made him very grateful there were no other crewmembers in earshot.

‘When your eggs are laid, will your time end?’

Jim blinked. He wasn’t sure if Envor was asking about human reproduction in general, or about him in particular, but the translator had been handling mood and tense pretty well since Spock’s intervention. ‘I don’t understand,’ he said cautiously.

‘You carry eggs,’ said Envor, shuffling back and forth on the spot, a behavior Jim was coming to recognize as intensifying or excitable. ‘I learned it from Spock’s mind, when our thoughts touched. When your eggs are laid, does your time end, as it does for our kind?’

‘No,’ Jim said quietly. ‘Humans, ah… humans give birth to live young, and we live on, to raise them.’

‘You and Spock will raise your own young.’

‘Yes.’ So, the Horta knew about him and Spock as well. Jim dropped his voice further. ‘One baby. A girl.’

‘When will you give birth?’ said Envor.

Envor and the others really were children, Jim realized—intelligent, far beyond what could be expected of a three-year-old in any humanoid species he knew of, but endlessly curious, and with no sense that there were some questions one didn’t ask. He couldn’t be other than honest with them, but neither did he want his crew finding out about his pregnancy from one of their gregarious guests. ‘In a few months,’ he said quietly. ‘But it’s… a secret, for now.’

Envor shuffled and purred. ‘What is a secret?’

That was the first concept the translator had really struggled with. It made sense, Jim reasoned: the Horta had a very open and cooperative society, and seemed to communicate in part telepathically. The result, Spock had said, was something like a hive mind, yet with strong individual personalities. Naturally there wouldn’t be much room for secrets between beings who shared thoughts so closely. ‘My crew don’t know about the baby,’ Jim explained.

‘Why do they not know?’

Jim smiled to himself. Envor was relentless; Jim supposed it was good practice for when he had an inquisitive little girl on his hands. ‘Because I haven’t told them yet,’ he said. ‘I will, but I haven’t, yet. That’s what a secret is. Only Spock and I know, for now, and Doctor McCoy—and you.’

‘Why?’

‘Because… sometimes, humans like to have secrets. It’s probably not very logical, but I suppose that’s one of the differences between your people and mine.’

Envor purred softly—thoughtful, perhaps. ‘We will have the secret, too,’ he pronounced.

‘Thank you. I appreciate that.’ Jim resisted the urge to give his companion a friendly pat. He doubted human body language meant much to a Horta—that was something else to ask Spock and Uhura about. Instead he leaned forward, hands on knees. ‘But, when you return home to Janus, I’d be grateful if you told Inala. I think I’d like her to know.’

 

Spock came to Jim’s quarters after dinner that evening to work on end-of-mission reports. Despite the excitement of their current assignment—and Jim’s pregnancy—the work of wrapping up the five-year mission continued in the background, and had seen them both putting in extra hours.

‘Envor knows about the baby,’ Jim dropped in, when they paused for tea.

Spock raised an eyebrow. ‘Did you tell him?’

‘No, he said he saw it in your mind, when you melded. Actually, he thought I was going to lay eggs. I corrected that bit. But he knew.’

‘Ah.’

That didn’t strike Jim as much of an answer. ‘You don’t seem surprised,’ he prompted.

‘I did not intend for this to occur; however, I am not surprised that it has.’

Jim was 99% sure that Spock was embarrassed, though of course he’d never admit to it. ‘But you shield, in a meld, don’t you? So, is this… native, Hortan telepathy?’

‘I do not believe so.’ Spock steepled his fingers. ‘When I melded with Envor, just after you stumbled—’

‘It was nothing, Spock.’

Spock hemmed, clearly not satisfied with Jim’s assurances, or McCoy’s. ‘Nonetheless, I was concerned for your health, and for our child.’

‘You mean you were preoccupied.’

‘Yes.’

Spock’s gaze was fixed on a spot on the far wall, and Jim knew he was castigating himself for that loss of control.

‘Has Envor shared this information?’ he asked eventually.

‘No. I told him we want to keep it a secret for now. I think he understood.’

That drew Spock from his introspection. ‘It cannot be a secret forever, Jim.’

‘I know—but, as I explained to Envor, sometimes it’s nice to have a secret.’ Jim reached across the table and caressed Spock’s wrist with his thumb. ‘Now, are we done, or are we going to press on with Geological Sciences?’

Even through their light contact, it was obvious to Spock which alternative Jim preferred. Jim’s desire hummed beneath the surface like a high-energy field. Spock had not commented, but it seemed to him that Jim’s normally vigorous libido had only increased with his pregnancy—and Spock was more than willing to accommodate him. ‘It is not essential that we complete this work tonight,’ he said, his own desire seeping through in the timbre of his voice.

‘I was hoping you might say that.’ Jim thumbed the door lock, then came around the other side of the desk. He turned Spock’s chair to face him, then climbed onto it, straddling Spock’s lap. ‘Mm.’ He dipped his head to kiss Spock’s lips—just lightly at first, enjoying the simple sensations of soft skin and shared breath as desire built within him. Now Spock’s arms came around him, running up and down his back—half massaging, half caressing—and Jim deepened the kiss, plumbing Spock’s mouth as he pressed their groins together.

Spock’s hands slid down Jim’s back to settle on his buttocks, pulling him closer still. Jim could feel Spock’s penis hard against his, through far too many layers of clothes. He grunted and squirmed, wanting more, needing more. He was ridiculously wet already, enough to have made a damp patch on Spock’s pants as well as his own. ‘Want you,’ he panted against Spock’s lips.

Spock’s reply was a soft growl. Then he stood, lifting Jim effortlessly, and carried him to the sleeping alcove.

‘Whoah.’ Jim didn’t like being carried, in principle, but if this was leading to hot sex he wasn’t going to rock the boat. He’d already dispensed with his boots, while they were working, and Spock had barely set him down before he was peeling off his pants and shirt. Spock undressed just as efficiently and was soon kneeling on the bed, between Jim’s legs.

Spock brushed his fingertips up Jim’s inner thighs, enjoying his responsiveness when touched in this sensitive place. Then, when Jim was writhing on the bed, Spock reached beneath his testicles to his weeping slit.

‘Yes,’ Jim hissed, bucking his hips. Jim was gripping his own penis hard against his belly, yet he craved Spock inside him, and Spock knew it. It had become the usual way they made love: one or both of them manipulating Jim’s cock while Spock penetrated him in what Jim absolutely refused to think of as his vagina.

Spock tormented him no longer. He settled between Jim’s legs and slid into him. They soon found their rhythm, Jim pumping himself in time with Spock’s thrusts. Spock’s hand joined Jim’s, and for a few minutes there was nothing else in the universe—not inquisitive Horta, not end-of-mission reports, not even the child swelling Jim’s belly; just the ecstasy of two bodies coming together as two halves of a whole, and then the climax that left them sticky, sated, and very soon asleep.


End file.
